7 comments:

Ha! Well from what I remember he never looked very Scandinavian. Still, I wouldn't fancy it.

The world has indeed gone nuts. When was the Rushdie Fatwa? That was bad enough, but seemed less widespread than this current absurdity. I get the sense that in the last 10 years or so, Muslim extremism has become much more prevalent across the globe.

My problem is that if the vast majority of Muslims are moderate, non-extremists - as we are constantly assured, and as I'd like to believe - where are they? They're not doing a very good job of presenting their point of view to the world's media. Whether that's because lots of people are, if not directly sympathetic, then at least tolerant of the nutters' views, or whether its because the nutters make better news stories, I don't know. But I wish a more moderate, debate-driven (and critical of the West if necessary) movement would emerge to counter the fundies.

Quite a good piece on the cartoons by John Simpson on BBC News Onlines. I never used to care for John Simpson before, but increasingly I've come to like his bland reasonableness in this era of media hysteria and ideological extremism.

"Muslims of the world, be reasonable. What brings more prejudice against Islam, these caricatures or pictures of a hostage-taker slashing the throat of his victim or a suicide bomber who blows himself up during a wedding ceremony?" - Jihad Momani, editor in chief of Jordanian weekly al-Shihan. Although he was then sacked for printing 3 of the cartoons.